Prison Architect features two game modes — story and escape. In story mode, the player follows the story of Edward, a man who is facing the electric chair for committing a crime of passion, while in escape mode, the player takes on the role of a prisoner attempting to escape from the prison.

On the Mac, Prison Architect requires 4GB RAM, a Core2 Duo processor or better, and 300MB hard drive space.

In addition to being available in the Mac App Store, Prison Architect can also be played on the iPad, as an iOS version of the game was released earlier this year.

The Mac App Store version of Prison Architect is priced at $29.99. [Direct Link]

Samsung first got a permit to test self-driving technologies in its home country earlier this year. The chaebol revealed then that it was planning to test the sensors and parts it’s developing aboard a Hyundai car. It unfortunately didn’t elaborate on what those components can do, but we might find out more details when the company starts testing them in California.

The number of companies testing on California roads is only bound to grow, especially now that the government is mulling on giving tech titans and automakers exceptions to federal safety rules. Next week, lawmakers are slated to vote on the SELF DRIVE Act that would prevent states from regulating autonomous vehicle designs. If it passes, companies like Waymo will be able to test 100,000 autonomous vehicles, though, in exchange they have to turn in more data to the feds.

The US government will allow people barred from entering the country in the early days of President Donald Trump’s travel ban to reapply for visas following a legal settlement with campaigners. 

Under the terms of the agreement, announced on Thursday, the government must contact all individuals who had been turned away at borders as a result of the president’s first executive order that came into force on January 27, and inform them they may seek re-entry.

It does not guarantee applicants will receive new visas nor does it award them compensation, but obliges the government to act in “good faith” when processing their paperwork.

The settlement also guarantees that those who reapply for their visas can do so with the help of the Department of Justice liaison for a three-month period.

The settlement brings an end to the case Darweesh v Trump, a nationwide class-action suit filed by two Iraqi men detained at New York’s JFK airport because of the ban. They were represented by numerous rights groups including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

‘Legal fight will continue’

It was the first legal challenge to the original Muslim ban, and had previously succeeded in gaining an injunction on removing anyone from the US on the basis of the ban.

“Although the government dragged its feet for far too long, it has finally agreed to do the right thing and provide those excluded under the first Muslim ban with proper notice of their right to come to the United States,” Lee Gelernt, an ACLU lawyer involved in the case, said. 

But the “legal fight against Muslim ban 2.0” would continue, he added, with the Supreme Court set to hold another hearing in October.

OPINION – The Muslim ban: Did Trump really win?

Gerlent said it is unclear how many people will benefit from the settlement because the government has refused to disclose the total.

The first order, which banned for three months nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries – Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen – and refugees for four months, caused chaos at airports and triggered protests across major cities.

Hundreds of nationals from the countries affected by the ban were detained on arrival despite having valid visas or even residency documents.

It was quickly challenged in court by campaigners and several US states, and was suspended on February 3.

A revised version was announced in March, barring nationals from the countries mentioned in the previous ban, except Iraq. The revised order also said that visa and green card holders were exempt.

The administration scored a partial victory in June, when the Supreme Court ruled that it could proceed with the ban, though people with a “bona fide relationship” to a US person or entity were exempt. 

Source: News agencies

Environmental activists have warned that a vast Amazon reserve is still under threat despite the suspension of a government decree that would open it up to commercial mining.

The federal court in the capital, Brasilia, said on Wednesday that it had “partially granted an injunction to immediately suspend any administrative act” aimed at annulling the Renca reserve, which is nearly the size of Denmark.

Judge Rolando Valcir Spanholo also said such as decision could not be made by decree and Brazil’s Congress would have to be consulted.

Yet, activists say Brazil’s Congress is dominated by ranching and mining interests.

Amid reports that the government is planning to appeal the verdict, many fear that the suspension could be a temporary block.

OPINION: Amazon – The final frontier?

“The judge’s decision could be overturned at any moment,” said Marcio Astrini, public policy coordinator at Greenpeace Brasil.

Brazil’s President Michel Temer signed the controversial decree made public last week to annul the Renca reserve which covers four million hectares across the Amazon states of Amapa and Para.

The area is thought to have vast quantities of gold, iron and other minerals.

In a statement emailed to Al Jazeera, Brazil’s Ministry of Mines and Energy said “the objective of the measure is to attract new investments, with the generation of wealth for the country and employment and income for society, in addition to expanding the supply of mineral goods, always based on the precepts of sustainability”.

Environmental groups immediately blasted the decree as catastrophic, prompting Temer to issue an updated version on Tuesday which further detailed protection measures to forest conservation units and indigenous territories inside the reserve.

‘Our culture depends on our land’

Al Jazeera visited Alamira village in the Indigenous Wajapi people’s territory, a two-hour drive by dirt road inside the Renca reserve. Men and women go bare chested wearing the tribe’s traditional dress of a red knee-length skirt with large slits up the sides. 

The Wajapi’s traditional lifestyle involves hunting deer and other forest animals, fishing, growing manioc, bananas and other crops, as well as gathering water and bathing in the rivers.

“Our culture depends on our land,” said leader Jawaruwa Wajapi, a city council member for the nearest municipality Pedra Branca de Amapari and one of the few Portuguese speakers in the Guarani Tupi speaking village.

“When the miners, leave the destruction of the land will remain.”

Jawaruwa Wajapi said he also feared that the mining companies would attempt to buy off the community with gifts.

“The mining companies will offer material things for us. If we accept this, it will be a mistake,” he said.

The Wajapi territory was officially demarcated in 1996, in a process that enables indigenous people to receive legal protections to their land. The territory is composed of dozens of villages and around 1,300 indigenous people according to local estimates.

Before the demarcation, the Wajapi suffered from an influx of illegal miners who flocked to the area after first contact with the tribe was made following the construction of the Perimetral Norte highway through the territory – part of the military government’s plan to connect the Amazon in the early to mid-1970s. The highway was never fully finished.

An illegal mining set up was found earlier this year near the Wajapi’s territory.

Elsewhere in the Renca reserve there is another demarcated indigenous territory called Paru d’ Este, which is home to the Tirio and Apalai indigenous people, as well as a sustainable extractive community of nut pickers called Iratapuru and seven environmental conservation units.

Critics say that none of the three traditional communities inside the reserve were consulted regarding the decision, despite it being a requirement of Brazil’s constitution.

‘Like combatting homicide by legalising murder’

The government of Brazil has emphasised that the Wajapi territory and other protected areas will not be will not be affected by the decree and mining will not be permitted there.

Environmentalists, however, strongly refute this claim.

“We can’t believe this from the same government that is reducing conservation areas in other protected regions in the Amazon,” said Astrini, of Greenpeace Brasil, referring to recent proposed legislation to reduce protected forest areas in the Amazon state of Para.

According to Astrini, Brazil’s Congress is trying to reduce environmental licencing requirements, just as the country’s environmental police, IBAMA, suffers from severe cuts which affects their capacity to make inspections and raids – a combination, he said, that would have disastrous consequences for the reserve if it is annulled.

‘Our river is dead’, life after Fundao dam collapse

Lucia de Queiroz Ferreira Szmrecsanyi, Wajapi programme coordinator at Brazil’s Institute for Research and Training in Indigenous Education, noted that legislation to allow mining on indigenous territories has been on Congress’ agenda for a long time.

“For the congressmen supporting the government this project is considered a priority,” she said.

The Renca reserve was founded in 1984 by Brazil’s then-military government as a safeguard for the mineral riches in the region, and was part of the government’s “occupy or lose” stance towards the Amazon at the time.

Brazil’s news portal G1 reported last week, after Temer’s decree, that a government note said the Renca reserve is “no paradise”, adding that illegal prospect gold miners already operate in the region and that the annulment of the reserve would regulate these activities.

READ MORE: Brazil court suspends mining on Amazon reserve

“Instead of combatting illegal mining, the government wants to legalise it. It’s like combatting homicide by legalising murder,” said Randolfe Rodrigues, an Amapa senator with the Rede Sustainability party.

According to Marcelo Oliveira from WWF Brasil, illegal mining in Renca reserve has left the rivers with high levels of mercury.

While noting the pollution that large mining projects could cause on the rivers, Oliveira also warned of the social impact. 

“These large projects will need access and infrastructure, highways, dams. In the beginning, this will attract lots of people to the region, but once construction is complete, very few people are needed and the workers are left in these areas, similar to what happened with Belo Monte,” he said, referring to the Belo Monte dam, constructed in the Amazon state of Para.

The city of Altamira where the dam was built attracted many migrant workers and now has some of the highest homicide rates in Brazil.

Antonio Feijao, a three time former Congressman, lawyer, geologist and head of consulting firm Amazon Global Consult in Amapa, who today provides services for the environmental commission of Brazil’s Senate, said that infrastructure and job creation are necessary for the state.

Amapa is one of Brazil’s least developed states with the highest level of unemployment in the country and incomes below national average, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and statistics.

“Seventy-two percent of Amapa state is already conservation area and these don’t create jobs,” Feijao said.

“The extinction of Renca will bring jobs, royalties for the cities and integrated infrastructure like roads that the local populations inside the reserve will also benefit from.”

But Rodrigues, of the Rede Sustainability party, refuted claims that the extinction of the reserve will be beneficial for citizens in the state.

“Our experience with mining in Amapa has not been positive,” he said.

“The business owners get rich while the environmental destruction and poverty gets left for the state.”

Source: Al Jazeera News

Colombia’s former FARC rebel group has renamed itself the Common Alternative Revolutionary Force, as it transformed into a political party following its disarmament.

“By a majority decision in our congress, the name of the new party has been fixed as the Common Alternative Revolutionary Force,” the group’s leader Rodrigo Londono wrote on Twitter on Thursday.

In spite of earlier resistance from some members of the movement, the name retains the revolutionary spirit of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) Marxist rebel group, which fought a bloody 52-year campaign against the state before signing a peace deal last year.

In Spanish the new name, Fuerza Alternativa Revolucionaria del Comun, has the same acronym as the former rebel force’s title, so it can continue to be referred to as the FARC.

READ MORE – Colombia: A Nobel Prize to save peace

Delegates from the newly demobilised FARC group have spent the week gathered in a founding congress to choose their political representatives ahead of next year’s general elections.

The party had yet to give an official English translation for its title.

The week-long congress comes after the group handed in more than 8,000 weapons and nearly 1.3 million pieces of ammunition as it demobilised, the United Nations said last month.

Roughly 7,000 FARC fighters have demobilised under the accord, which allows the group 10 unelected seats in Congress until the end of 2026 and grants amnesty to the majority of ex-fighters.

READ MORE – Colombia: Paramilitary groups take over abandoned FARC territory

The FARC was formed in the early 1960s by guerrillas affiliated with Colombia’s communist party intent on resolving longstanding issues such as land disputes and government neglect of rural areas, issues that still resonate in much of the nation today.

Over the next five decades, the conflict between the rebels, government forces and right-wing paramilitaries claimed at least 250,000 lives and left another 60,000 people missing. Millions more were displaced from their homes fleeing the bloodshed.

Londono said at the start of the congress that the group will advocate “a democratic political regime that guarantees peace and social justice, respects human rights and guarantees economic development for all of us who live in Colombia”.

Source: News agencies

The technology created by and patented by iLife was designed to detect when elderly individuals fell and monitor babies for sudden infant death syndrome. It sought $144 million in damages, or $4 for each of the 36 million Wii systems sold prior to the suit being filed, along with an injunction against Nintendo’s use of the technology in question.

Nintendo said it didn’t infringe on the patent and that the patent was improperly written, causing it to be invalid. Around the same time that it sued Nintendo, iLife also filed patent infringement suits against a number of other companies — including Fitbit and Under Armour — that involved the same patents listed in the Nintendo case. Both of the Fitbit and Under Armour suits were dismissed by the parties themselves and presumably settled out of court. Nintendo plans to appeal the ruling, according to reports from Rolling Stone.

As with Instagram Stories in the mobile app, on the web, Stories will be featured at the top of the page. Clicking or tapping into a story will allow it to be viewed. For now, Instagram Stories is view only, but in the future, Instagram plans to allow Stories uploads from the web on mobile devices.

Instagram launched Stories just over a year ago in August of 2016 to compete with Snapchat, and the feature has been highly popular with Instagram users. As of April, Instagram Stories has more daily active users than Snapchat.

The feature allows users to post photos and videos that disappear after 24 hours. Like Snapchat, it includes filters, stickers, emoji, and other image enhancement tools. Today’s update also includes new weather-related filters that can be applied to photos.

According to Instagram, Stories on the web is rolling out starting today, but it will take a few weeks for the feature to show up to all users. Posting from the mobile web will be implemented in the coming months.

A white police lieutenant in the US state of Georgia who was recorded on video during a traffic stop saying “we only kill black people” will be fired, a local police chief has said.

Cobb County police Chief Mike Register told reporters on Thursday that he has started the process to terminate the employment of Lieutenant Greg Abbott.

Dashcam video from July 2016 shows a car stopped on the side of a road. A white woman can be heard telling Abbott she was scared to move her hands in order to get her mobile phone, local television station, WSB-TV reported.

Abbott interrupts her and says, “But you’re not black. Remember, we only kill black people. Yeah. We only kill black people, right?”

Abbott, who has been an officer in Cobb County for more than 20 years, was placed on administrative duty last week, pending an investigation.

Earlier on Thursday, Abbott’s lawyer, Lance LoRusso, said in a statement to The Associated Press that Abbott is cooperating with the investigation, and his comments were meant to “de-escalate a situation involving an uncooperative passenger”.

But Register said later on Thursday that regardless of the context, such comments are “unacceptable”. 

READ MORE: – Donald Trump to police – Don’t be too nice to suspects

“No matter what the context, statements like these are unacceptable and are not indicative of the type of culture we are trying to facilitate here in the police department, as well as within the county,” Register said in an emailed statement. 

LoRusso was not available for comment regarding the expected termination of employment.

More than 1,000 killed

US police departments have been under increased scrutiny in recent years for the disproportionate number of shootings of black Americans by police.

According to the Guardian newspaper’s The Counted database, at least 1,093 people were killed by police in the US last year.

Nearly a quarter of those killed were African Americans although the group accounts for roughly 12 percent of the total US population.

READ MORE: Structural racism in the US won’t diminish with time

Civil rights campaigners and activists say the disproportionate number of black Americans killed by police is part of a broader pattern of racial discrimination in the country’s justice system.

These disparities, particularly the killing of African Americans by police, has prompted the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, a popular civil rights movement aimed at ending police violence and dismantling structural racism.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Roman ruins stretching out over 20 hectares have been discovered off the coast of northeastern Tunisia, confirming “with certainty” a theory that the city of Neapolis was partly submerged by a tsunami in the 4th century AD.

“It’s a major discovery,” Mounir Fantar, the head of a Tunisian-Italian archaeological mission which made the find off the coast of Nabeul, told AFP news agency on Thursday.

He said that an underwater expedition had found streets, monuments and about 100 tanks used to produce garum, a fermented fish-based condiment that was a favourite of ancient Rome.

“This discovery has allowed us to establish with certainty that Neapolis was a major centre for the manufacture of garum and salt fish, probably the largest centre in the Roman world,” said Fantar.

“Probably the notables of Neapolis owed their fortune to garum.”

Fantar’s team started work in 2010 in search of the port of Neapolis, but only made the breakthrough find of the ruins this summer thanks to favourable weather conditions.

The discovery also proved that Neapolis had been partly submerged by a tsunami on July 21 in 365 AD that badly damaged Alexandria in Egypt and the Greek island of Crete, as recorded by historian Ammien Marcellin.

Source: AFP news agency

Samsung got approval to test autonomous vehicles on state roads in California, according to the CA Department of Motor Vehicle’s website. The DMV maintains an ongoing list of companies and organizations it has granted autonomous testing permits to, and that list includes a growing number of automakers and tech companies, including Apple, Nvidia, GM, BMW and now Samsung.

Samsung has already gotten the green light to test self-driving vehicles in South Korea, as we reported back in May, but its California license means the tech giant is likely looking to start testing its technology stateside as well, in the backyard of rivals including Waymo and Apple.

The South Korean company has already revealed modified Hyundai cars, equipped with test hardware built by Samsung including sensors and AI-powered computer modules. Samsung looks like it aims to provide software and platform for autonomy in a supply capacity at the very least, but its ambitions could extend further than that, too.

Samsung maintains a San Jose office, from which it could operate California-based tests. The company’s far-reaching supply relationships could give it an edge as a self-driving software platform provider, once the technology becomes more ubiquitous.

Featured Image: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

It is a humanitarian crisis that is growing continuously. A week after former UN chief Kofi Annan released a report with recommendations to end years of persecution of the Rohingya people, the situation in Rakhine state in Myanmar appears to be getting worse.

Women and children are among the tens of thousands of the ethnic Muslim-minority Rohingya community trying to get across the border into Bangladesh. But Bangladesh does not want them. Security is being tightened and many people are being turned away, leaving them stuck in no-man’s land.

The refugees tell of attacks by the Myanmar military, of Rohingya villagers being killed and their homes set on fire. But the Myanmar army says it has launched a security crackdown on a rebel group after coming under attacks.

The biggest obstacle to peace is Myanmar citizenship. The commission led by Annan says all restrictions on Rohingya should be lifted and describes them as the biggest single stateless community in the world.

But is the international community listening, and will it do anything about it?

Presenter: Hashem Ahelbarra

Guests:

Phil Roberston – Deputy director of Human Rights Watch, Asia

Kim Jolliffe – Independent consultant working with development and humanitarian organisations in Myanmar

Tun Khin – President – UK Burmese Rohingya Organisation

Source: Al Jazeera News

Iran remains in compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal made with the world powers, according to a UN atomic watchdog report.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Thursday that Iran’s stock of low-enriched uranium is used for peaceful purposes, and did not exceed the agreed limit of 300kg.

The report was the third since the January inauguration of US President Donald Trump, who has vowed to “dismantle” the “disastrous” accord between Iran and six major powers curtailing Tehran’s atomic activities in exchange for sanctions relief.

While US sanctions imposed over Iran’s nuclear work remain suspended, Washington has ramped up others related to Tehran’s support for “terrorism”, its ballistic missile programme and its human rights record.

Iran says this contravenes the “spirit” of the deal, an accusation fired back by Trump at Tehran because of its funding and supplying of armed groups “across the region”.

The 2015 accord covered only Iran’s nuclear activities and the new IAEA quarterly report showed that these remained in compliance.

What the report says

The report did not explicitly say Iran is honouring the deal but mentions no deviations by Tehran, The Associated Press news agency said.

The confidential report obtained by various news organisations said the agency continues to hunt for “undeclared nuclear material and activities”.

READ MORE: Iran – Top priority to protect nuclear deal from US

It added that Iran “has not pursued the construction of the Arak … reactor” – which could give it weapons-grade plutonium – and has not enriched uranium above low purity levels.

The number of enrichment centrifuges also remained as agreed, while Iran’s store of heavy water, a reactor coolant, was 111.0 tonnes after it exported 19.1 tonnes to an unnamed country.

Iran has previously inched above an agreed ceiling of 130 tonnes. The plant producing the heavy water was shut for maintenance earlier this year and has now restarted, the IAEA said.

Trump is due in October to certify to Congress whether Iran is sticking to the nuclear deal. In July he told the Wall Street Journal he “would be surprised if they were in compliance”.

As well as the US, the hard-fought agreement also includes China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany. French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday there is “no alternative” to the deal.

Tehran has warned that if the deal falls apart it can ramp up its atomic programme again within five days, giving Trump a second nuclear crisis to add to the standoff over North Korea.

Source: News agencies

Sony just announced a new camera called the RX0, but breaking from the trend of lower number = fancier camera, this one is a tiny device that combines an action-cam form factor with some traditional imaging prowess. It’s an unusual combination, yet somehow tempting.

The waterproof, shockproof RX0 has a 1-inch, 15-megapixel (cropped down from 21) sensor and a 24mm-equivalent F/4 lens, which right off the bat differentiates it from GoPro cameras, which generally have smaller sensors with super-wide-angle, relatively slow glass in front. But it lacks a zoom and many of the other useful features of a pocket camera like the RX100. So you’re not going to be walking around taking snapshots with this thing.

It seems that the RX0 is being put forth as a sort of modular system for videographers who need the ruggedness and versatility of a GoPro but want a bit more control and fidelity. B cameras on set and outside (depending on the image quality), shooting from multiple angles (multiple RX0s can sync together), super slow-mo footage (it goes up to 960 FPS), and so on.

While its $700 price tag might be a bit much for people who just want a camera to attach to their bike or surfboard, there are plenty of people who would opt for the RX0 instead of a GoPro.

It’s an odd little device, no doubt, but the more I think about it, the more I feel I’d prefer it for non-traditional duties. It’ll be available in October.

Featured Image: Sony

On the heels of setting the date for its big fall iPhone event, Apple is coming out swinging for net neutrality. In a letter to the FCC, Apple’s U.S. Vice President for Public Policy Cynthia Hogan advocates for the open internet, cautioning against practices that would allow providers to favor some forms of traffic while throttling the speed of others.

“Broadband providers should not block, throttle, or otherwise discriminate against lawful websites and services. Far from new, this has been a foundational principle of the FCC’s approach to net neutrality for over a decade. Providers of online goods and services need assurance that they will be able to reliably reach their customers without interference from the underlying broadband provider,” the letter argues.

Apple goes on to voice its opposition to internet fast lanes, also called “paid prioritization,” a practice that would allow broadband companies to sell content providers faster access for some consumers.

“Paid fast lanes could replace today’s content-neutral transmission of internet traffic with differential treatment of content based on an online providers’ ability or willingness to pay. The result would be an internet with distorted competition where online providers are driven to reach deals with broadband providers or risk being stuck in the slow lane and losing customers due to lower quality service,” Hogan wrote.

Apple cites the fear that broadband providers create “winners and losers,” a scenario in which big companies could afford to pay up and emerging companies would suffer.

“Apple remains open to alternative sources of legal authority, but only if they provide for strong, enforceable, and legally sustainable protections, like those in place today. Simply put, the internet is too important to consumers and too essential to innovation to be left unprotected and uncertain,” the letter states.

As a major platform for streaming entertainment, Apple has a clear stake in the fight for net neutrality — one that’s only likely to grow as the company invests aggressively in making its own original content.

The emir of Kuwait will hold talks with US President Donald Trump in Washington, DC next week, according to the Kuwaiti state media, as a three-month-old diplomatic crisis splits the Gulf.

KUNA news agency said on Thursday that Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah would depart for the United States on Friday and the Trump meeting was scheduled for September 7.

The emir is a key mediator between Qatar and its neighbours – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.

The trio and Egypt cut diplomatic and economic ties with Qatar on June 5, imposing an air, land and marine blockade on the country, accusing it of ties to Iran and “extremist groups” as well as interference in their internal affairs.

Qatar denies the claims and accuses the other countries of an attack on its sovereignty.

READ MORE – All the latest updates about the Gulf crisis

On Thursday, Qatar’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad bin Abdulrahman Al Thani called on the blockading countries to stop attempting to influence his country’s foreign policy.

“There is no [evidence] against Qatar. Qatar never interferes in any country’s politics, and doesn’t accept others to interfere in our politics,” he said at a news conference in Brussels, Belgium.

The US has given mixed signals about its policy on the Gulf crisis.

Trump immediately expressed his support for Saudi Arabia, but some other US officials, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, later adopted a more measured tone.

On Wednesday, Trump spoke with Saudi King Salman and urged an end to the dispute.

Riyadh and Doha are both key allies of the US.

OPINION: GCC crisis – Why is Kuwaiti mediation not working?

Trump chose Saudi Arabia for his first overseas visit as president in May, two weeks before the Gulf crisis erupted.

Qatar is meanwhile home to a huge US air base, where the headquarters of Centcom – the regional command which leads operations against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group – is based.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Back in 2015, Sensorwake burst onto the scene as a Kickstarter project that replaced a noisy alarm clock with scents. Created by 18-year-old student Guillaume Roland, the device managed to raise nearly four times as much cash as intended. Now, the company, which is now renaming itself Bescent, is launching three follow-ups.

The first two are the aforementioned kiddie versions, which are called Lexibook by Sensorwake with branding from Frozen and of the Minions. Rather than the wide variety of nuanced scents available in the adult equivalent, each device will only produce one scent. The former, in tribute to Olaf the Snowman, will shoot out peppermint smells, while the latter will make your home smell of bananas.

Rounding out the trio is the Sensorwake 2, an updated version of the original that won the hearts and minds of everyone on Kickstarter. Because the idea of smell-based alarm clocks is a little off, the company has refreshed the hardware with dynamic lighting and melodies. In addition, Bescent is unveiling a whole host of new capsules, including chocolate, cappuccino and fresh grass.

The Lexibook by Sensorwake will be available in Europe from the start of November, setting you back €59 ($71) and will travel to the US at some point afterward. The Sensorwake 2, meanwhile, is priced at €99 and will hit store shelves across Europe and Japan in October.

Follow all the latest news from IFA 2017 here!

The United States has told Russia to close its consulate in San Francisco, in retaliation for Moscow’s demands that the size of the US mission in Russia be cut, according to the State Department.

The announcement on Thursday also included a demand for a reduction in the Russian diplomatic presence in Washington and New York by Saturday with the closure of a chancery annex in Washington and consular annex in New York.

Last month, Russia ordered the US to cut its diplomatic and technical staff in Russia by more than half, to 455 people, after Congress overwhelmingly approved new sanctions against Russia.

In spirit of parity, we require #Russia to close its consulate in SF, chancery annex in DC, and consular annex in NYC by Sep. 2. http://pic.twitter.com/8YeFncDO4l

— Department of State (@StateDept) August 31, 2017

“We believe this action was unwarranted and detrimental to the overall relationship between our countries,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement on Thursday.

“In the spirit of parity invoked by the Russians, we are requiring the Russian Government to close its Consulate General in San Francisco, a chancery annex in Washington, DC, and a consular annex in New York City,” Nauert said.

“These closures will need to be accomplished by September 2.”

READ MORE: Trump thanks Putin for expelling US diplomatic staff

In response, Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement that Moscow “will closely study the new measures announced by the Americans, after which our reaction will be conveyed”.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also held a phone conversation with his US counterpart, Rex Tillerson, and expressed his concern about “the escalation of tensions” between the two countries.

The dispute began when former US president Barack Obama expelled 35 Russian diplomats in December over allegations of Russian interference in last year’s presidential election.

“This is a back-and-a-forth that has been going on,” Al Jazeera’s Kimberly Halkett, reporting from Washington, DC, said.

“Certainly this is a stepping up by the US in terms of the tit-for-tat relationship that has been going on, and many would see deteriorating, in recent months,” she added.

In order to deal with the reduction in staff in Russia, Washington said last week it would have to sharply scale back visa services, a move that will hit Russian business travelers, tourists and students.

The Russian consulate in San Francisco handles work from seven states in western US.

There are three other Russian consulates separate from the embassy in Washington. They are in New York, Seattle and Houston.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Six months after a deadly shooting at a Quebec City mosque, its president’s car was deliberately set on fire, officials said on Wednesday.

“Another hateful act” targeted the mosque and its president Mohamed Labidi in addition to “a long series” of other incidents, the Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec said in a statement.

The fire was set on August 6 but was only made public on Wednesday in order to allow police to investigate.

Mosque officials and the mayor linked the fire to an August 4 announcement of the upcoming opening of the city’s first Muslim cemetery.

“It would be a strange coincidence” if the two were not somehow related, said Quebec City mayor Regis Labeaume.

OPINION: Quebec mosque shooting – Beyond the official rhetoric

Police are not ruling out any motive, whether it was a hate crime against Muslims or just a random act of vandalism, said police spokesman Jean-Francois Vezina.

Labeaume had championed the new Muslim cemetary as a sign of support for Quebec City’s relatively small Muslim community following an avowed white supremacist’s killing of six worshippers at a local mosque in January.

The “increase in hateful gestures” toward the Muslim community in Quebec City is “worrying,” Labeaume commented.

These incidents come as nationalist or right-wing extremists in the Canadian province have become more vocal against immigration and “radical Islam”.

In June, a group left a pig’s severed head at the entrance of the mosque targeted by the lone gunman.

Police are investigating these incidents but no suspects have been named so far.

Source: AFP news agency

TCL actually bought the Palm name back in 2014, four years after HP acquired the brand and then shuttered its products a year later after they underperformed. That seemed a tragic end for Palm, which had led the late 90s and 2000s consumer device market with its PDAs and early smartphones, like the Pilot and Pre, respectively. But it looks like TCL is going to introduce an undisclosed number of devices under the Palm name early next year.

That’s all we really know, thanks to an interview the company’s marketing manager Stefan Streit gave to Android Planet. While he wouldn’t divulge what kind of devices would be included, he did tease that smartphones could be a possibility. The only other thing he revealed was Palm’s intended place in TCL’s portfolio. Rather than try to spice up the brand for new consumers, Streit mentioned that the new Palm devices would be geared toward users familiar with the old ones that ruled the gadget world before the new millennium. Whether that impacts their design or just how they’ll be marketed is unclear.

We can assume that the new Palm devices will run Android, just like TCL’s KEYone BlackBerry phone. The operating system Palm originally developed for its devices, webOS, was included in its acquisition by HP and then sold off to LG, which continues to use it in its tablets and Smart TVs.

We’ve reached out to TCL for comment and confirmation, and will add it here when we hear back.

A Brazilian court has suspended a recent government decree that would open a huge Amazon reserve to commercial mining, after the initial decision sparked outrage from environmentalists and political opponents. 

The federal court in the capital Brasilia said in a statement on Wednesday that it had “partially granted an injunction to immediately suspend any administrative act” aimed at scrapping the Denmark-sized reserve, known as Renca.

The order from Judge Rolando Spanholo “suspends possible administrative acts based on the decree”, which was signed by President Michel Temer last week.

READ MORE: Brazil scraps Amazon reserve to allow mining

Spanholo said that the government had failed to consult Congress, as required under the constitution, and that the decree would “put at risk the environmental protection (of Renca) and the protection of local indigenous communities”.

The centre-right government’s lawyer immediately said it would appeal the verdict.

The Renca reserve in the eastern Amazon is home to the indigenous Aparai, Wayana and Wajapi tribes and vast swaths of untouched forest, covering more than 46,000 square kilometres.

Renca contains important reserves of gold, manganese, iron and copper which until now have been available only to relatively low-level state-owned mining. Illegal miners also operate in the area.

More than two-thirds of the Renca area that lies in Amapa state are subject to conservation controls or protections for indigenous areas that would limit mining, leaving only 31 percent open to research and exploration, according to a 2010 government report.

Temer says that opening up the gold and mineral-rich area to mining is part of his program to boost Brazil’s weak economy.

The government insists that vital areas within the reserve, including where indigenous people live, will remain off limits.

However, campaign groups like Greenpeace, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), celebrities, as well as Brazil’s influential Catholic hierarchy, have pushed back in an unusually broad-based campaign for Latin America’s biggest country.

“Pressure is working,” Greenpeace said on Twitter after the court ruling. “We mustn’t stop.” 

OPINION: Amazon: The final frontier?

Moira Birss, from the non-profit organisation Amazon Watch, had also condemned the decree by the Temer administration.

“The Amazon is extremely crucial to the global climate,” Birss told Al Jazeera last week. “Deforestation and destruction of even small parts of the Amazon have a major ripple effect for the entire global climate.”

Temer, who came to power a year ago after the impeachment of his leftist predecessor Dilma Rousseff, is attempting to enact austerity cuts and market reforms aimed at loosening up Brazil’s stagnant economy.

In July, the president had sent a proposed deforestation bill to Congress seeking to cut preservation areas of the Jamanxim National Forest in the Amazonian state of Para by 27 percent, about 350,000 hectares. 

Earlier in August, Brazil’s Supreme Court ruled in favour of indigenous groups after the Mato Grasso state seeked compensation for land that had been declared tribal reserves.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has been in Qatar as part of efforts to find a common ground in the Gulf crisis.

His visit to the Qatari capital of Doha on Wednesday came at the end of a three-nation tour of the region that also included Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. 

Lavrov is the highest-ranking Russian official to come to the Gulf since the crisis began. He says Russia fully supports the emir of Kuwait’s efforts to bring an end to the blockade against Qatar that began on June 5.

But what can Russia do to help end the blockade?

Presenter: Hashem Ahelbarra

Guests:

Fahad bin Mohammed Al-Attiya – Qatar’s ambassador to Russia.

Vyacheslav Matuzov – Former Russian diplomat, now chairman of the Russian Friendship Society with Arab countries.

Abdullah Baabood – Professor of international relations and political economy of the Gulf at Qatar University.

Source: Al Jazeera News

Watching the NFL can be expensive, and cable sucks.

Some of us like sports but don’t want to pay for channels we’ll never watch. Fortunately there are ways to watch the NFL without cable for the 2017-2018 season.

I’m a Baltimore Ravens fan, and I live in San Francisco. It will cost me $17.87 per game to watch every Ravens game from the 2017-2018 NFL season without cable, satellite, or antenna. That’s a lot less than it costs to have access to the same games through DirecTV or cable when you’re an out-of-market fan.

Depending on where you live, your experience will differ. If you’re interested in watching NFL games without cable this season, here’s how i did it.

How I came up with the estimate

Before diving into how I came up with this number, there are a few things to note. First, I’m watching with an over-the-top device (Fire TV, Apple TV, etc). Second, this assumes your internet bill has already been paid for the month because why on earth would you not have broadband access? And finally, it assumes you only want to watch your team play.

You’ll still be able to watch most games with a similar setup to mine, but each team, regional market and TV network has its own unique requirements. It is still possible to watch every game without cable in most markets, but it’s more expensive than what I’ve outlined here.

Now, let’s look at the costs of the different services you’ll need to make the streaming magic happen.

NFL Sunday Ticket is the most expensive of the services, but it will get you the most games as an out-of-market viewer (in my case, 10 Ravens games).

CBS ALL Access previously did not get you access to the NFL games, but this season it will. CBS All Access will be particularly valuable if you watch an AFC team, as most AFC team games are on CBS.

Sling might be a little confusing at first, but basically there are three different packages (Orange, Blue, and Orange +Blue), and you need Orange + Blue. The Orange package gives you ESPN for Monday Night Football, and the Blue gives you FOX and NBC. If you buy the Orange + Blue package you get the benefits of both the Orange and Blue packages for a slight discount.

Now let’s look at the 2017-2018 Baltimore Ravens schedule and see what services I’ll need for each game.

If we add up the costs, it looks something like this: NFL Sunday Ticket for the whole season ($200) + Sling Orange + Blue for November and December ($80) + CBS All Access (limited commercials option) for October ($5.99) = $286 for the season, or $17.87 per game

While $17.87 might seem like a lot per game compared to MLB, NHL, or NBA, it’s much cheaper than the following alternative options.

Watching every game at a bar

Yes, going out to a bar to watch the game is more expensive. Of course, a lot of the cost depends on your alcohol intake and how far you live from a bar, but in most cases the Lyft ride to and from the bar is more than $18.

Add in a few beers for the game, and it’s easily more expensive to go to the bar than to pay to watch at home. Also, the bars won’t likely be open at 6:30 a.m. PT for that week 3 game against the Jaguars in London.

Watching every game through DirecTV or cable

Yes, cord cutting is still cheaper. If you are an out-of-market fan, you’ll still have to buy the DirecTV NFL Sunday Ticket package even if you already have traditional DirecTV satellite service or cable. That’s $200 on top of whatever your existing service package is.

Unless you can get four months of DirecTV for under $86 ($286 total calculated above minus cost of DirecTV NFL Sunday Ticket), DirecTV satellite service will be more expensive than cord-cutting. You also need an unobstructed southern-facing location to mount the satellite dish, which isn’t the easiest thing to find in San Francisco.

How to set this up for your own team and market

• Go to your team’s website and get the game schedule.
• Determine if each game is in-market or out-of-market. I live in San Francisco, so in-market would be if I wanted to watch the 49ers or Raiders. In-market also includes nationally televised prime time games (Monday Night Football, Sunday Night Football, some Sunday afternoon late games) because they will be aired in your local market. Out-of-market would be all other games.
• Figure out which TV networks are airing each game.
• Anything that’s on FOX or CBS and out-of-market, you’ll be able to watch with NFL Sunday Ticket.
• Anything that’s in-market will require Sling TV’s Orange + Blue package (FOX, NBC, ESPN) or CBS All Access.
• Thursday Night games are not included with DirecTV’s NFL Sunday ticket package for cord cutters. You can watch them for free on Amazon or for $5.99 per month with the CBS All Access app.
• The four games in London are a bit of a curveball because each one is a little different. The Ravens/Jaguars in week three will be aired for free on Yahoo. The Saints/Dolphins and Cardinals/Rams games are both on FOX, so you should be able to watch with either Sling Orange + Blue or NFL Sunday Ticket. The Vikings/Browns game is only on NFL Network, so you’d need Sling TV Orange + Blue to watch it regardless of your location.

If you haven’t made the jump to cord cutting for the NFL, there’s no better time than now.

Featured Image: Bernhard Lang/Getty Images

A US-led coalition battling ISIL says its fighter jets have blocked a convoy of the group’s fighters evacuated from Lebanon from reaching eastern Syria, and also struck a number of their comrades travelling from the other direction to meet them.

The strikes on Wednesday were aimed at derailing a deal for fighters of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) to leave their enclave on the Lebanon border, along with their family members, for areas the armed group holds on Syria’s eastern frontier with Iraq.

The evacuation deal, brokered by Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Syrian army, sparked a furious reaction from Iraq and the United States.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said moving hundreds of fighters towards the Iraqi border was “unacceptable” and “an insult to the Iraqi people”, while US officials said ISIL fighters should be killed on the battlefield.

READ MORE: ISIL evacuation deal angers Iraq

The first set of strikes on Wednesday took place east of Humeima in southeast Syria, said Ryan Dillon, a spokesman for the coalition.

“To prevent the convoy from moving further east, we cratered the road and destroyed a small bridge,” he told AFP news agency. 

Coalition military forces conducted airstrikes in #Syria to prevent the transport of #ISIS terrorists to the borders of our Iraqi partners. http://pic.twitter.com/HLVonJz1P4

— Brett McGurk (@brett_mcgurk) August 30, 2017

Dillon said the coalition understood there were civilians aboard the buses, and would only bomb the convoy if fighters could be separated from the civilians.

Describing ISIL as a “global threat”, he said “relocating terrorists from one place to another for someone else to deal with is not a lasting solution”.

Later, coalition fighter jets also bombed ISIL vehicles heading towards the convoy from the Syrian town of Albukamal. 

‘Only way’

The buses, which left the Lebanese-Syrian border two days ago, were now stuck in territory held by Syria’a government, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based group monitoring the country’s conflict via a network of contacts on the ground.

There were about 300 fighters and almost as many family members, including children, on the buses being evacuated, according to Hezbollah, which defended the evacuation deal saying it was the “only way” to find out the fate of nine Lebanese soldiers ISIL had kidnapped in 2014.

The deal also involved ISIL surrendering Hezbollah and Syrian army prisoners and bodies in east Syria.

Hezbollah had fought a week-long offensive against ISIL on the Syrian side of the border with Lebanon, coinciding with a simultaneous assault by Lebanese troops on their side of the frontier.

The battles ended on Sunday with the announcement of the evacuation deal.  

READ MORE: Lebanon finds suspected remains of ISIL-held soldiers

ISIL is on the back foot in both Syria and Iraq, losing swathes of its territory and its most important towns and cities.

In Syria, the US-led coalition is backing an alliance of Kurdish and Arab armed groups in the north which are assaulting ISIL in the city of Raqqa.

The Russian-backed Syrian army and allied armed groups have meanwhile seized most of the central desert from ISIL, and are advancing eastwards to relieve the army’s besieged enclave in Deir Az Zor.

Source: News agencies

The group of engineers, who originally came to Apple from several Detroit carmakers and suppliers among other automotive companies, are said to specialize in designing hardware like braking and suspension systems.

The latest exodus to Zoox suggests Apple is less likely to revive ambitions to make a car itself. The engineers found themselves increasingly sidelined and surplus to requirements at Apple, and were hired by the startup in piecemeal fashion in recent months, the people said.

It’s not entirely clear yet what Apple plans to use its autonomous driving software for, but the company is exploring options like self-driving shuttles to ferry its employees from campus to campus as part of further testing. In the future, Apple could partner with a ride-sharing company or a car manufacturer to deploy its software.

Zoox, meanwhile, is working on an a full autonomous car in order to create a fleet of autonomous vehicles. The company has raised more than $250 million and has a valuation of more than $1 billion.

Tropical storm Harvey has make a second landfall in the US state of Louisiana as large parts of Texas remain underwater following record rainfall that forced tens of thousands of people from their homes.

Since coming ashore on Friday, the heavy rains have reportedly claimed the lives of at least 20 people and sent more than 32,000 to shelters, turning neighbourhoods into lakes in Houston, the country’s fourth largest city.

On Wednesday, Harvey went on to swamp a stretch of coast from Port Arthur, Texas, to Lake Charles, in neighbouring Louisiana.

READ MORE: Hurricane Harvey – What you need to know

“The worst is not yet over for southeast Texas as far as the rain is concerned,” Governor Greg Abbott said, referring to the area that includes Beaumont and Port Arthur.

He warned residents of the storm-hit areas to expect floodwaters to linger for up to a week.

National Guard troops have rescued more than 8,500 people since the storm began, Abbott said.

‘Worst fears realised’

Taking advantage of a lull in the rainfall, rescuers on Wednesday recovered the bodies of six family members from a van which was swept away by the floods over the weekend.

Manuel and Belia Saldivar and four of their great-grandchildren – ranging from six to 16 years in age – went missing on Sunday as they were attempting to escape rising waters.

“We have a total confirmed six dead here at the scene inside this van,” Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez told a press conference. “Our worst fears have been realised.”

IN PICTURES: Harvey causes havoc in Texas

With hundreds of people are still unaccounted for, there is little doubt the final toll will rise further although officials stress many may simply have no access to phones or power.

“A third of the city remains underwater,” Al Jazeera’s Heidi Zhou-Castro, reporting from Houston, said.

“That is unprecedented and up until this point rescuers have really used every minute of their time trying to reach the backlog of desperate calls for help to get to those who life is in imminent danger,” she added.

“As the waters are starting to recede, the emergency workers are just starting to catch their breath knowing that there are thousands of square kilometres that need to be combed in the search for those missing.”

Outside Houston, more than 50cm of rain had fallen overnight in the communities of Beaumont and Port Arthur in eastern Texas, officials said.

The floods shut the country’s largest oil refinery in Port Arthur, in the latest hit to US energy infrastructure that has sent gasoline prices climbing.

READ MORE: Facing Hurricane Harvey

Some 14,000 members of the Texas National Guard had been deployed and the total number was expected to climb to 24,000 members, including from other states, using some 600 vehicles, 500 boats and 100 helicopters.

Some 32,000 people were in more than 230 shelters, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was beginning to move families out of shelters and into transitional housing at hotels.

The Toyota Center arena in central Houston was opened on Tuesday to house additional flood victims. Some 10,000 people were already staying the George R Brown Convention Center, double the building’s capacity.

Some 210,000 households had already registered with FEMA for financial assistance and 37 million dollars had already been provided, officials said.

Moody’s Analytics is estimating the economic cost from Harvey for southeast Texas at $51bn to $75bn, ranking it among the costliest storms in US history.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner pushed the government to quickly approve funds for relief efforts and clear any regulatory hurdles to recovery.

“I’m hoping that people at the federal level, at the very top, will understand this was catastrophic,” Turner said at a news conference on Wednesday.

“We just need the red tape to be cleared. All of us have to act with a degree of urgency.”

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Have you ever wanted to print an animated image? Well now you (almost) can. A maker named Abhishek Singh has created an instant camera that outputs a little box that contains a Raspberry Pi connected to a PiTFT screen. When you take a picture the camera transmits a short video to the screen which the plays it over and over again until you take another picture. The entire project is hand-designed and 3D printed and it’s a clever little hack that you can even build yourself.

Singh made a how-to for folks wishing to follow in his hacking footsteps. This isn’t even Singh’s first GIF project. His robot, called Peeqo, also responded entirely in GIFs along with standard Alexa conversations. Singh was part of NYU’s ITP program and this project came about thanks to his love of “building things, animated movies, and GIFs.”

Wouldn’t it be cool if you could 3D print a camera that printed out a flip book? Maybe that could be Singh’s next project.

Security researchers at ESET have discovered a new malware campaign targeting consulates, ministries and embassies worldwide to spy on governments and diplomats.

Active since 2016, the malware campaign is leveraging a new backdoor, dubbed Gazer, and is believed to be carried out by Turla advanced persistent threat (APT) hacking group that’s been previously linked to Russian intelligence.

Gazer, written in C++, the backdoor delivers via spear phishing emails and hijacks targeted computers in two steps—first, the malware drops Skipper backdoor, which has previously been linked to Turla and then installs Gazer components.

In previous cyber espionage campaigns, the Turla hacking group used Carbon and Kazuar backdoors as its second-stage malware, which also has many similarities with Gazer, according to research [PDF] published by ESET.

Gazer receives encrypted commands from a remote command-and-control server and evades detection by using compromised, legitimate websites (that mostly use the WordPress CMS) as a proxy.

Instead of using Windows Crypto API, Gazer uses custom 3DES and RSA encryption libraries to encrypt the data before sending it to the C&C server—a common tactic employed by the Turla APT group.

Gazer uses code-injection technique to take control of a machine and hide itself for a long period of time in an attempt to steal information.

Gazer backdoor also has the ability to forward commands received by one infected endpoint to the other infected machines on the same network.

So far ESET researchers have identified four different variants of the Gazer malware in the wild, primarily spying on Southeast European and former Soviet bloc political targets.

Interestingly, earlier versions of Gazer were signed with a valid certificate issued by Comodo for “Solid Loop Ltd,” while the latest version is signed with an SSL certificate issued to “Ultimate Computer Support Ltd.”

According to researchers, Gazer has already managed to infect a number of targets worldwide, with the most victims being located in Europe.

Meanwhile, Kaspersky lab has also published almost similar details about Gazer backdoor, but they called it ‘Whitebear’ APT campaign.

Samsung’s wearables family gets a little bigger today with the addition of the Gear Sport. The new fitness-focused smartwatch arrives a few days after Fitbit finally debuted its long-awaited Ionic device, the latest in a growing acceptance among hardware makers that activity tracking continues to be the prime driver in the wearables space, smartwatches, included.

The new watch isn’t won’t be replacing the Gear S3 that Samsung introduced last year — instead it’s filling out the line. It does mark a bit of a departure from that product, though — the S3 moved away from its sleek predecessor, instead opting for a giant and ruggedized take on the space in line with offerings from companies like Garmin. That said, it was a good watch — but it was way, way too big. I’m around six-foot, and I found the thing uncomfortably large. We tried it out on the wrist of our 5’4″ video producer, and it looked downright silly.

Big has worked for Samsung in the smartphone space, but the human body is less forgiving than pants pockets, and the company ultimately did itself something of a disservice by creating the watch equivalent of the Galaxy Note. Among other things, the Gear Sport is smaller than the S3, with a 42.9mm face, versus 46mm. That’s smaller, but by no means small. The Sport is, in part, a chance to appeal to a wider range of wrists, and it’s also an attempt for Samsung to reconfirm its commitment to health wearables.

After all, even Apple, a rare success in the smartwatch sector, has doubled down on health features in recent months. The new watch features built-in heart rate monitoring, does swim tracking (it also has a 5ATM water resistance rating) and takes advantage partnership with Under Armour to offer up a variety of different fitness and sleep tracking apps. There’s also automatic activity detection and built-in motivation alerts. Pretty standard fitness watch features, those.

Samsung also dropped a number of features for the smaller watch, including Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) payments (though the more popular NFC is still on-board), and the LTE phone-free option the S3 had that everyone is suddenly so excited about on the Apple Watch.

The company is also using its stage at IFA to introduce the Gear Fit2 Pro, a new version of the company’s fitness band that features most of the above mentioned tracking features, along with a more comfortable band. That was one of the one of its predecessor’s biggest issues. Samsung’s IconX ear buds are getting a new, more comfortable design as well, along with Bixby support (naturally) and different color options, including pink.

The Gear Fit2 Pro will be available starting September 15, for $200. Pricing and availability for the other two is still forthcoming.

Tesla’s most expensive vehicle offerings got a discount overnight thanks to improvements in the production efficiency of the 100 kWh batteries that are used in their construction. The discounts range from $3,500 to $5,000, depending on the model, and include both the Model S and Model X top trims.

As Electrek reports, the 100D models of both the X and the S got a $3,500 discount with the new pricing, and the P100D versions get a larger $5,000 price cut. These actually restore price levels to where they were for the highest available trim packages before a small increase was put in place in April, which came alongside a discount for entry-level vehicles.

These pricing changes affect current orders that have not yet been fulfilled, according to Electrek, which is a nice surprise. Improvements in the 100 kWH battery pack process should also help Tesla keep up with demand, which is growing at last check thanks to a halo effect spiking interest around the launch of the new, more affordable Model 3.

Here’s exactly how the new pricing structure breaks down:

• Model S 100D: $97,500 -> $94,000
• Model S P100D: $140,000 -> $135,000
• Model X 100D: $99,500 -> $96,000
• Model X P100D: $145,000 -> $140,000

UN human rights experts have raised “grave concern” over a widening “assault on freedom of expression” in Egypt, condemning the blocking of scores of news websites and the unlawful detention of journalists.

Some 130 websites may have been banned by the Egyptian government on allegations of “supporting terrorism” and “spreading lies”, David Kaye and Fionnuala Ni Aloain said in a statement on Wednesday.

The blockings appear to be based on “overbroad counter-terrorism legislation” and lack any form of transparency, the UN’s rapporteurs said, adding that most of the websites were banned without warning.

“Limiting information as the Egyptian government has done, without any transparency or identification of the asserted ‘lies’ or ‘terrorism’, looks more like repression than counter-terrorism,” they said.

READ MORE: Al Jazeera slams Egypt’s treatment of Mahmoud Hussein

The sites shut down or blocked in Egypt include that of news organisations, such as Al Jazeera, MadaMasr and Al Watan, as well as the websites of human rights groups, including Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information.

The latest crackdown began in late May when authorities blocked access to 21 websites. At the time, anonymous security sources told local media that all the banned sites contain material that “support terrorism and extremism as well as publish lies”.

Some financial newspapers have also been banned, including Al-Boursa, which generally avoids politics and reflects the views of a largely pro-state business community.

Kaye, the rapporteur for freedom of expression, and Aloain, the expert on human rights and counter-terrorism, said the situation of journalism, freedom of expression, and access to information in Egypt has been in crisis for many years.

“It takes many forms, including the unlawful detention and harassment or journalists and activists,” they said, urging the government to release all detained journalists.

Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud Hussein is one of many journalists imprisoned in Egypt. He has been detained without charge since December 2016. 

Hussein has repeatedly complained of suffering mistreatment in prison and denial of legal rights. 

Earlier this month, RSF, a global press freedom group which describes Egypt as one of the world’s biggest prisons for journalists, said it was yet to obtain an explanation for the reason behind the blocking of its website.

Several outlets, including Masr Al Arabia and Mada Masr, have also submitted requests to government ministries and media regulators asking for a reason, but have had no success, RSF said.  

Censored online media are trying to keep their content available to Egyptian readers via VPNs, a software that enables users to bypass blocking by masking their IP address and appearing not to be in Egypt.

However, the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE), an Egyptian NGO, said on Tuesday that 261 websites providing VPN services were now inaccessible in the country. 

Last week, the United States informed Egypt it would withhold $290m in official assistance because of its failure to make progress on respecting human rights. 

Source: Al Jazeera News